AES E-Library

AES E-Library

This study compares interaural intensity differences (IIDs) of a real source and those resulting from a phantom source created by pair-wise amplitude panning in an anechoic environment with a listener situated in the sweet spot. The results indicate that the translation of panning gain ratios to IIDs depends on the source frequency, the individual’s HRTFs, the loudspeaker angle, and the source direction angle. For small loudspeaker angular apertures, the IIDs of a phantom source are typically larger in absolute sense than those of a real source from the direction predicted by the panning laws under test, especially above 1 kHz. The most conservative panning law (sine-cosine) generally results in the best correspondence between phantom and real source IIDs. For wider loudspeaker angular apertures the IID of the phantom source is either smaller or larger than the IID of the real source, depending on the sound source frequency and the panning law under test.